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Rachel
Calder

Rachel Calder is a first-year student in the Bioinformatics Master's program. Rachel received her bachelor's at the University of Washington Bothell Campus where she conducted RNA-Seq research with Dr. Thelma Madzima. She then transitioned to her role as Education Coordinator at the Insitute for Systems Biology. In this role, she conducted research with scientists and translated that research into open-source curriculum and experiences for students. A passion of Rachel's is to lower the barrier to entry for students to participate in STEM fields, and to make sure students are supported once in the field. In her role, she developed a passion for data science and simultaneously earned her Certificate of Data Science from the University of Washington. She used her data science skills to build tools for ISB scientists studying therapy mechanisms of cancer cells and the evolution of viruses.
Rachel is continuing to pursue data science and bioinformatics through the Bioinformatics Master’s program at Georgia Tech. Rachel joined Georgia Tech to study the dynamic interactions between bacteriophages and their hosts with the Weitz Group, and is supervised by Marian Dominguez-Mirazo. Rachel has a passion for understanding infectious disease dynamics, creating computational tools that assist in scientific discovery, and lowering the barrier for people to engage with science. She is thrilled to develop all three interests within the Weitz Group.